Hasta La Creative!

A Sainsbury’s supermarket in England recently put out an ad seeing an “ambitious artist to voluntarily refurbish our canteen.” But what they really need is a scotobiologist, since all they got in response was shade. 

Artists, you see, don’t like being asked to work for free by companies that are more than able to pay them, and a number of them voiced their frustration on social media using the hashtag #PayArtists. 

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Havas Worldwide Chicago Group announced the appointment of Celia Jones as group brand director today. She will be responsible for both strategic brand building and external marketing, reporting to U.S. Chief Growth Officer Laura Maness. Jones will also be tasked with managing external communications, events and thought leadership, and will serve as “point person for all media inquiries for the Havas Chicago Group.”

Jones arrives at Havas following over seven years at digital agency Critical Mass, where she served as global marketing director, led external marketing communications across all of the agency’s offices worldwide and played an important role in global expansion. Prior to Critical Mass, Jones served as director of content and lead copywriter at Designkitchen (a WPP Wunderman unit) for two years. Commenting on the hire, Paul Marobella, president, Havas Worldwide Chicago Group, cited Celia’s “unique combination of marketing savvy, communications expertise, digital acumen and a passion for brand storytelling…”

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CP+B announced the appointment of Jason De Turris, previously vice president, executive planning director, as its chief strategy officer. In the new role, De Turris will relocate to Hong Kong and oversee strategy on the Infiniti account, which the agency recently won AOR duties for following a review launched in the summer. He will also help open CP+B’s Hong Kong office and be responsible for building “the CP+B culture and brand throughout Asia” while still acting as a strategic leader across CP+B’s offices. CP+B said in a press release that it will appoint a new head of planning in North America in the near future.

While at CP+B, De Turris has worked with brands such as Xbox One, Grey Poupon, Best Buy, and Hotels.com. He previously served as senior planner at Ogilvy & Mather and Deutsch and as a planning director at JWT. Back in 2011, he also spent five months as a professor of strategic communications at Columbia University. (more…)

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This morning we can confirm that Grey New York notified “under 30? staffers that their employment with the agency will end in January.

The cause of the reduction is client Eli Lilly, which recently decided to consolidate work for one of its many pharmaceutical products under an alternate agency on its roster.

Grey has worked with Lilly for nearly 20 years and won a greater share of the business from G2 back in 2012; its Grey Healthy People unit, launched in 2011 to handle a growing roster of related brands from Lilly, Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline and others, continues to operate (though the name itself has been retired).

Despite reductions that seem to have touched all departments, the agency’s relationship with the client will, for the most part, continue unaffected. The move concerns the diabetes drug Humalog, and Grey will retain other Eli Lilly brands including its best-known product, Cialis.

In a statement, Grey says that it chose to give employees advance notice in order to help them find new positions as soon as possible, noting that its New York office is currently “over 1,000 people strong” and that it has hired 75 new staffers in 2014.

At the moment, we do not know which agency will handle the diabetes work moving forward. Updates as they come in.

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Three weeks ago, we broke the news that CarMax, maker of Super Bowl ads featuring slow claps and puppies, would not be working with New York’s Silver+Partners for its next Big Game spot.

The ensuing review quickly turned into a competition between three southeastern agency offices, and yesterday Adweek reported that McKinney had won the account.

Sources told us that BBDO Atlanta was not the winner, but we didn’t receive responses from McKinney or CarMax before the Adweek post went live. Newly installed CMO Jim Lyski subsequently confirmed the win, writing that the company chose McKinney in order to “tell our unique story and connect the brand with consumers.”

Updates/official statements if we receive them. In the meantime: puppies.

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Yes, our Wednesday post on rumors that some portion of the Corona business would be up for review was extremely vague. But we were correct: the beer’s parent company just announced that it will no longer be working with GS&P.

Our sources told us nothing about which parts of the business would be changing hands, but both GS&P and Corona Light’s parent company Constellation told AdAge this afternoon that they had “mutually agreed to end their relationship.”

So Corona Light/Modelo has launched an agency review. An unnamed GS&P spokesperson said:

“Both parties agree that it’s time for a change, and we wish them nothing but success in the years ahead.”

Cramer-Krasselt is apparently safe for now, as Corona Extra is not on the list of divisions seeking new creative representation. And while Modelo is less of a household name than Corona, it could be the real prize for whichever agency wins the forthcoming pitch: a year ago market watchers were already calling it “the new Corona” and noting that its sales increases were considerably higher than those of its sister brand. Modelo has yet to run a national TV campaign, so the winning agency will, in all likelihood, be responsible for launching that effort next year.

The AdAge piece tells us nothing about the shops that have already started pitching Constellation, but this week a source did mention the letters D, D, and B…

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Sonic has signed a multi-year endorsement deal with Oklahoma City Thunder forward Kevin Durant, the brand’s first sports endorsement deal, Adweek reports.

As part of the deal, Durant will star alongside Sonic’s “Two Guys” in a national broadcast campaign expected this summer. The “Two Guys” in question, New York-based former The Colbert Report writer Peter Grosz and Chicago-based improv comedian T.J. Jagodowski, have been a staple of the brand’s advertising since being brought back by GSP+P in early 2012, two years after being phased out after their initial run with Kansas City-based agency Barkley. Durant will also be involved with Sonic educational charity Limeades for Learning and will help brainstorm new menu items.

Durant achieved instant-celebrity with his emotional acceptance speech for the NBA MVP award, which, coupled with his connection to Sonic’s hometown of Oklahoma City, attracted the attention of CMO Todd Smith. “What really happened was the MVP speech that he made last year really pushed him into a national presence more, but also, his likability is off the charts,” Smith told Adweek. “For us, we wanted someone who has a hometown feel with a national presence because that’s the type of brand we are.”

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M&C Saatchi, after two failed attempts to set up shop in New York City, is purchasing a one-third stake in SS&K, to serve as M&C Saatchi’s New York outpost, The New York Times reports.

Both agencies are expected to make the announcement today. The financial terms of the deal remain undisclosed, but M&C Saatchi’s stake is estimated at 33 percent, with the remaining majority share still in the hands of co-founders and partners Rob Shepardson, Lenny Stern and Mark Kaminsky. M&C Saatchi’s New York office, meanwhile, is expected to close by the end of year.

SS&K opened back in 1993 as Shepardson, Stern & Kaminsky, and continues to grow, recently adding HBO, Starbucks, E*Trade, Jackson Hewitt, Wells Fargo, Fresh Direct and The New Yorker to its client roster. The agency will become M&C Saatchi’s New York presence but will continue to keep its own name, and through its connection to M&C Saatchi will gain access to that agency’s global network, which includes offices in London, Tokyo, Los Angeles, Sydney, Paris and Madrid.

“With hindsight, I don’t think we ever invested, if we’re honest with ourselves, the time or money to create a flagship office in Manhattan, the toughest of all markets,” Moray MacLennan, worldwide chief executive of M&C Saatchi, told The New York Times. “It’s a brutal old town you have.”

MacLennan cited the departure in July of Jeff Brooks, chief executive of M&C Saatchi New York, for MDC’s Assembly as “…the catalyst for our change of direction.” He also said he hopes to “move across” at least some people and clients to SS&K, adding, “we’re already working on an international pitch with SS&K.”

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AKQA Co-Founder and Chief Creative Officer James Hilton is leaving the agency to open his own London design firm, AdAge reports.

He will be succeeded by Rei Inamoto, who was already AKQA’s lead creative for the U.S. and Asia. Also as a result of Hilton’s departure, the agency is promoting Europe creative lead Duan Evans to international executive creative director, responsible for overseeing creative across Europe, Asia and South America. Hilton will not be completely severing ties with the agency, however, as he will serve as chairman of a new group entitled AKQA Alumni, “through which alumni will host events, share ideas and provide mentoring for the next generation of talent.”

Hilton and CEO Ajaz Ahmed founded AKQA around 20 years ago, expanding the shop over time to include over fourteen offices globally. WPP bought the agency back in 2012 and, according to AdAge, it is unclear if Hilton was offered an earnout as part of the deal. AKQA declined to comment to that publication on the question. Hilton’s new product and design firm is called AtelierStrange. (more…)

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Since the embargo has passed, we can tell you that Wix, a company calling itself “the leading web development platform,” has moved beyond sponsored Facebook posts to drop the $4 million required to buy an ad during next year’s Super Bowl.

The press release doesn’t include much beyond that: no hints regarding the coming ad’s theme or tone, though we did learn in September that the company named New York’s Silver+Partners its AOR. The release also tells us that the company has achieved “massive” growth despite lacking a sales team by “executing a wide array of online and offline marketing and advertising initiatives.”

For reference, here’s one of those initiatives, created six months ago by New York agency Special Guest:

After the jump, one of those branded “events” we keep hearing about.

(more…)

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.